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THE LAND OF BEGINNING AGAIN 



THE LAND 
OF BEGINNING AGAIN 



BY 

LOUISA FLETCHER 

(MRS. WILLARD CONNELY) 




JISCIRE • gvoD? 
PSCIENDVMJ 



BOSTON 

SMALL, MAYNARD AND COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 






Copyright, 1921 
By small, MAYNARD AND COMPANY 

(incorpokated) 



THE MUBRAT PBINTINQ COMPANY 
CAMBBIDGE, MASS. 



FEB 151922 

©C!.A653846 



• To the editors of Harper's Monthly, Contemporary 
Verse, Scribner's, The Century, Smart Set, McClure's, 
Metropolitan, Ainslee's and Cosmopolitan, in which maga- 
zines certain of the poems in this volume first appeared, 
thanks are due for their courteous permission to republish. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

The Land of Beginning Again 3 

Mandarin Red 5 

Strife's End 6 

Debussy 7 

Singing River. . . . 9 

The Convalescent 12 

Compensation 13 

A Timid Lover 14 

Defection 15 

The Lie . . . . 16 

The Enemy 18 

Siege 19 

In White Samite 20 

To Happiness 21 

Mirage. . .- 22 

Hummingbirds and the House of Croesus . 23 

The Smiling Mesa 24 

One Only 25 

To One Too Compassionate 26 

Fettered 27 

A Lover's Trilogy 

I Magnificat 28 

II The Beloved 30 

III Absence . 32 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

The Life Between . 34 

Pan in Hiding 35 

Perversity 37 

Capri 38 

Anacapri 39 

"Ask of Me Not My Strength" .... 40 

Travail 41 

Night and the Reader 42 

Two Masters . 43 

After the Auction 44 

Cedars at Monterey 45 

Deirdre 46 

Love me with all thy Tears 47 

Sedition . 48 

From One Apart 50 

At the Crossroads 51 

Importunate 53 

Life 54 

Toll-Gate 55 

To A Vis-a-vis 56 

To A Very Little Boy. 58 

Petition . 59 

After Reading Walt Whitman 60 

The Cup of Hemlock 62 

To Enos — A Protest 63 

Potentialities 64 

Hours of New Summer 65 

Pastorale (Sonata I) 66 

Cliff's Edge 67 

July Green 68 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Nippon Fisherman's Song 69 

The Shop of God 70 

Ex-Impassionata 72 

"Such Stuff as Dreams are Made On" . . 73 

Eden Prairie 74 

To AN Old Bokhara 75 

evenfall 77 

Cognizance 78 

Mater Dolorosa . 79 

To Cesira Dancing 81 

Indian Summer 82 

Vox Humana (with an Orchestra at the Orangerie) 83 

Uncomforted 84 

A Prayer - 85 

Song 87 

Fulfillment . 88 

Blood of Youth 89 

Life Sits A- Waiting 90 

Impromptus 91 

I would not Barter Rue for Rose. ... 92 



THE LAND OF BEGINNING AGAIN 



THE LAND OF BEGINNING AGAIN 

I wish that there were some wonderful place 

Called the Land of Beginning Again, 
Where all our mistakes and all our heartaches 

And all of our poor, selfish grief 
Could be dropped;, like a shabby old coat, at the door. 

And never put on again. 

I wish we could come on it all unaware. 

Like the hunter who finds a lost trail; 
And I wish that the one whom our blindness had done 

The greatest injustice of all 
Could be at the gates, like an old friend that waits 

For the comrade he's gladdest to hail. 

We would find all the things we intended to do 
But forgot, and remembered — too late. 

Little praises unspoken, little promises broken, 
And all of the thousand and one 

Little duties neglected that might have perfected 
The day for one less fortunate. 

It wouldn't be possible not to be kind 
In the Land of Beginning Again; 

3 



THE LAND OF BEGINNING AGAIN 

And the ones we misjudged and the ones whom we 
grudged 

Their moments of victory here 
Would feel in the grasp of our loving handclasp 

More than penitent lips could explain. 

For what had been hardest we'd know had been best, 
And what had seemed loss would be gain; 

For there isn't a sting that will not take wing 
When we've faced it and laughed it away; 

And I think that the laughter is most what we're after 
In the Land of Beginning Again ! 

So I wish that there were some wonderful place 

Called the Land of Beginning Again, 
Where all our mistakes and all our heartaches 

And all of our poor, selfish grief 
Could be dropped, like a shabby old coat, at the door, 

And never put on again. 



MANDARIN RED 

I am the color of audacity, 

Of rhythmic tribal dance, of tropic love. 
I am that tinct released upon the air 

When cymbals kiss, or comets meet above 

'I am the color of a twanging lilt 

Played underneath a Spanish windowledge. 
I am a sudden born when these are wed: 

A braggart's laughter and a coquette's pledge. 

Look for me in the lanterned nights of June, 
Swinging by flimsy wires to fruit the dark 
That lovers seek at rustic festivals, 
. Deep orange bubbles floating in the park. 

Look for me when you read a page of Kim, 
Drink of me when you hear Chanson Indoue, 

Know me one rapturous instant, when the wing 
Of tanager beats flame into the blue. 

I am the blood that leaps in Harlequin, 

The pulse of all things riotous and fleet. 
A deal of me, and you have carnival; 

A little — and the heart must skip a beat ! 

5 



STRIFE'S END 

My house is hushed, its doors are fast, 
He whom my soul desired has come. 
I dwell with him in quiet there, 

The pallid loneliness is past. 

The day of bartering is through. 
Harsh echoes of the traffickers 
Have fled, and in exchange have left 

The deep tranquillity of two. 

Into a rest my soul has slipped. 
Ceased is the come and go of feet, 
The visit of this friend and that; 

Unpledged the flagons once they lipped. 

The give and take of speech is spent, 

Its hundred petty wounds are staunched; 
Profound and heahng is the night, 

My spirit broods upon content. 

I watch within my placid home 

The soft flames rising from the hearth. 
I tend with endless joy that fire; 

He whom my soul desired has come. 

6 



DEBUSSY 

Musical malcontent! 
Weaver of ecstasies that end in pain ! 
Lover of contrasts, with a soul of scorn 
For maudlin melody sustained and tame ! 
Mischievous unrelenting conjurer 
•Of wraiths so elementally opposed 
That all the air is filled with captured cries 
Of joy and grief! 

Miner of dissonances rich with gold 
As tumbled quartz, swift riv'd by pick and sluice ! 
Distiller of strange decoctions 
For those two inseparable insatiables 
That eternally linger, 
Contentedly sprawling, 
In the tavern of Everyman's soul — 
The deep-drinking wassailer who feels, 
And his fellow- wassailer who thinks. 

Painter of chimes on the wind! 

Of cloud shadows on lakes. 

Of forests that murmur in their sleep. 

Of swaying branches interlocked, 

Of leaves that kiss, trembling. 

And kiss again ! 

7 



DEBUSSY 

Mariner of wild seas and haunted shores ! 

Disdainful of safe harbors where the waves 

Are tiny and monotonous, and purged 

As clean and tasteless as the bone-white beach, 

You plunge your silver prow into the swell 

Of heaving giant breasts, 

And come to port 

Bedecked with a victor's hasty -gathered loot, 

The unfamiliar flotsam of strange depths 

Unravished until now! 

Only when I have drunk of you 

Do I, with passionate surety, accept 

The puzzling pattern of my chartless course 

As something heaven-designed. 

Only when I stand near 

The altar where you heap your offering 

Of oddly-tangled sheaves — 

Tares with your wheat, 

Poppies of blood, and vines 

That strangle when a hand too covetous 

Would pluck their blossoms — 

Only when I see ascending high 

The flame-streaked smoke of your enkindled soul. 

Dare I, with heartened spirit, mount the steps 

Of my dishevelled temple, and in prayer 

Ask God to look upon my offering, 

Chaos, bewilderment, resurgent thoughts 

Put daily to the torch — 

My sacrifice! 

8 



SINGING RIVER 

Within the hillside I began. 

Before I knew the light I deeply slept 

Beneath the mountain's brooding mother-breast. 

J know not how I came there; I believe 

My mother must have drawn me from the clouds, 

And windstorms, must have drunk me from the mists 

That filletted and kissed her lovely head. 

Breathed of me in her thick and spicy pines. 

And colored me with prisms crystalline 

From all the suns and moons she gazed upon. 

From buried fountains in her heart I sprang. 
My song the fluting of the timid brook. 
Where pale fronds fringed and leaned caressingly. 
Where once a doe and eaglet came to drink. 
From sunny pools that musically dript 
To shadow-mottled sands I hasted on 
With rhythmic plashing as my eddies grew. 
Until within a sudden, impetuous gorge 
I whirled and leapt cascading to the plain. 
My mother's arms relaxing from me whilst 
I freed me from her honey-flowered lap. 

9 



SINGING RIVER 

My song to miglitier volume rushes now, 

Telling of tasks and service greatly done. 

I chant of waterwheels and murky towns. 

Of high-spun bridges and of plowing craft. 

I bear upon my sinews, flowing swift. 

The burden of that ceaseless intercourse. 

I gather stains that are not of myself, 

The wheel that churns me does not choke my pulse. 

My song swells out and I am not dismayed. 

My spirit listens and I faintly hear 

Other far voices flowing into mine. 

My theme grows thunderous and my urge immense, 

My surface more majestic; on my bed 

I feel the seagrass growing, and I sing 

With slow awakening knowledge of my goal. 

I feel a salty freshness in my veins, 

And in my throat strange cleansing like a tide. 

I gain a sense of my profundity — 

An ecstacy of limitless estate. 

Long-dreamed-of harmonies to which my song 

Has been a prelude and a prophecy 

Engulf me, merging all my melody 

To endless heave and surging of the sea. 

And now a measureless tranquillity. 
Freedom, and utter purity are mine. 
Now is it given me — although my voice 
Is lost in the welcome of the shouting waves, 

10 



SINGING RIVER 

Lost in the dissolving laughter of the sea — 

To know with surety but these two things : 

That as a separate life I am no more. 

But tasting many lives in one so vast 

That confines are unthinkable. And this. 

That from this warm immensity I shall 

Return through all eternity to sing 

Gf my hill-mother's arms and cradling breast, 

To sing of voyaging, of gradual growth, 

Of finding that, in all my widening ways, 

A mighty love had led me from the first. 

Summoning me from ageless shaggy hills. 

Shaping my course until I knew myself 

A river liberated unto life. 

Partaker of a rapture none may win 

Save from the unlocking hand we call our death. 



11 



THE CONVALESCENT 

From where I sit and watch, she looks 
So feather-Hght upon her bed. 

Her breast so deUdate and small. 
It scarcely seems to rise and fall 
Beneath the lightly woven shawl. 

Yet they have brought her back to life, 
Almost they brought her from the dead. 

Her fingers, slim and fluttering. 
Pluck softly at the covering, 
Pluck at my heart past uttering. 

From where I sit and watch, she looks 
So little, gentle, so betrayed. 

Will she call out for that wee thing 
That slipped into the enshadowing, 
That could not stay for mothering? 



12 



COMPENSATION 

You are not gone. I find you everywhere; 
In every fragrance trembling on the air, 
In every color that you loved to wear, 
I find you there. 

Each melody you sang, each tale you knew, 
The paths we traced together, and the blue 
Reflected in the willowed pool, renew 
The thought of you. 

I must not grieve. I must be sure the clear 
White dawn is but a sign of you, nor fear 
Lest sometime, in a sweet, uncounted year, 
I'll find you, dear. 



13 



A TIMID LOVER 

I'd like to make a song to you, 
A song so witching sweet and true 

That even the least atune with love 
Would, half -attending, hear it through. 

The song lies sleeping in my heart; 

I guard its slumber without rest; 
For when it stirs I am afraid 

And lay my hand upon my breast. 

I hush it off because I know 

It is so witching sweet and true; 

I could not bear to give it life 
Unless you'd let it live with you. 



14 



DEFECTION 

As the leaf drops from the tree 
So parts my thought from thee. 
And an exaltation new 
Of my freedom thrills me through, 
Sends me questing fortunes new. 

Yet how brief this liberty ! 
Falls the leaf but 'neath the tree, 
Flits my thought but back to thee 
When 't has tasted truancy. 
Wearied of wild Romany. 

Leaves go dancing down the lane. 
Breezes blow them back again. 
I, with rover's joy replete, 
Seek my old place at thy feet. 
Rest contented at thy feet. 



15 



THE LIE 

As from some rayless cavern of the mind, 

Wherein misshapen thoughts might breed their kind, 

A he — bhnking and hideous in the sun — 

Crawled suddenly from out the sable folds 

That robed a woman I had held most rare. 

I gasped, half -reaching to destroy the thing 

She'd given such strange asylum to. Whereon, 

Meeting her eyes, I saw not fear, nor shame. 

Nor loathing of the hateful presence there, 

But such a challenge to molest it not 

As only parenthood can put in eyes. 

Such looks are dizzy with eternity. 
In such — the measure of an indrawn breath — 
There may pass out forever from the heart 
An offended host of glorious, gleaming wings. 
I stared and stared, and then — I looked away. 
Her face had vanished in a blinding cloud. 
Mist of my tears on my hot anger fallen. 
I heard the sable robe's receding swish. 
The small, metallic clang of gauds she wore, 
And finally the silence, swallowing up 
Those insolents of sound. 

16 



THE LIE 

Then gratefully, 
As if it knew the mocking footfall gone, 
The stricken air became once more endued 
With freshness that revived my shaken pulse. 
I breathed again, I shook the nightmare off. 
Thought even to rid me of its memory. 
And heal with laughter what my soul had seen. 
But, as I turned to go, a loathsome shape 
Reared itself horridly from out the grass 
And sped before me in the path that she 
Who'd sheltered it, had taken just before. 

Then was it borne upon me that this hour 
Of disenchantment had been big with doom. 
That which had come of it, and had escaped 
To soil the world, would banefully fare on 
Unscathed, unbridled, fattening to its prime; 
That it would viciously complete the round 
Of victims in its cycle of deceit. 
Its last ironical repast achieved 
When she who gave it birth should fall its prey, 
O'ertaken by the thing she left behind. 
Blinking and hideous in the sun — the lie. 



17 



THE ENEMY 

You shall not come between me and the light, 
You shall not block the path my soul has set. 
Though I must lift and bear you all the way, 
Though I must seize and bind you to my side, 
I'll wear you as the warrior wears his shield; 
You shall not come between me and the light. 

As, at the last, my brother you shall be, 

We shall go on together till the end. 

Though you may strike, and, striking, see me fall. 

Though you escape me for a certain space, 

I shall arise and overtake your feet. 

For at the last my brother you shall be. 

All men are greater than the deeds they do. 
My love is greater than your utmost hate. 
Though each may struggle in his separate cause, 
Though we be blind to understand the fray, 
We shall achieve our brotherhood at last. 
For men are greater than the deeds men do. 



18 



SIEGE 

At night, pale thoughts of you assail my sleep, 
Softly besieging, like these futile wings 

Of frail white moths that flutter in defeat 

Against my window-pane; vague, thwarted things! 



19 



IN WHITE SAMITE 

I thank thee, dear, for all thou hast not given, 
For all the sayings thou hast left unsaid; 

Thou'st loved me with thy silence and thy shunning 
And I — I've loved my dream of thee instead. 

Still we have loved — have hungered for each other, 
Have trod alone — and this, for love's dread sake; 

Never to prove love's measure, lest it fail us. 
Never to know — and this, lest one heart break! 



20 



TO HAPPINESS 

Though I pursue you fondly, 
(And that's as it should be) 

You're just one step beyond me — 
One step 'twixt you and me. 

Wings, I would not overtake you, 
(The world's as I'd have it wag) 

My clumsy touch might break you 
I pray you, do not lag! 



21 



MIRAGE 

I see you as I saw you then. The sky 
Was luminous behind you, and the hills 

Were purple as the asters in your arms, 

And shadow-sweet as autumn wine that fills 

October's beaker to its golden rim. 

A bronzed bramble clinging to your skirt, 
Adown the dusty, leaf -red road you came, 

With scarf of misty river-green, and hair 

Loose-caught and smould'ring with the sunset flame 

And leaping like the torch of Phaeton. 

I see you as I saw you then. The sky 
Was luminous behind you, and your eyes 

Were purple as the asters in your arms. 

And shadow-sweet as autumn dreams that rise 

Unbidden on the heart of loneliness. 



22 



HUMMINGBIRDS 
AND THE HOUSE OF CROESUS 

(An Impression of Santa Barbara) 

On the hill the house of Croesus, 
Here below — an aloe tree 

With innumerable winged creatures 
Sipping from it ceaselessly; 

Glancing, darting, chittering gaily 
As they probe each honeyed cell. 

In an iridescent rapture 

Throbbing in the sunlight's spell. 

On the hill the house of Croesus 

And upon its lordly roof 
Blinks contentedly a Uzard 

On his gUstening tile aloof. 

On the hill the house of Croesus, 

Here below an aloe tree. 
And an air wingfilled with music 

For the Hstening heart of me. 



23 



THE SMILING MESA 

I have been too long in the sunland, 

Too long away from the shade. 
I have gazed at a face that smiled and smiled 

Till it drove me stark afraid. 

But here whole days are soft with mist, 

Like pitying eyes. My fears, 
And the smarts of the sunland's scorching kiss, 

Are healed by their cooling tears. 



24 



ONE ONLY 

Many keys shall strive to turn the lock of thy heart, 
O most fugitive and fair beyond men's dreams — 
But only one shall slide the bolt on its delicate secret 
hinge. 

Many lands shall unroll their vistas of beauty before 

thee, 
O wistful-eyed and eager-footed child — 
But to one only shalt thou turn in the years of thy 

crimson sunset. 



25 



TO ONE TOO COMPASSIONATE 

Give not thy breast to suckle stillborn hopes, 
(None drain as they, for all they be so pale) 
Unless to thine own heart thou hast grown cold. 
Nor let thy roof give shelter to regrets; 
Not ripeness to thy house, but swift decay 
Follows their presence, as the damp spreads mould. 



m 



FETTERED 

Why drag a captive phantom at thy heels 
To twitch the robe of thy fehcity? 
Why put a ball and shackle on the past 
When it is but a wraith none sees but thee? 



27 



A LOVER'S TRILOGY 

I 

Magnificat 

Now, beholding you, is heaven thrown wide ! 

Now, beholding you, do my eyes drink from the spring 

of eternity ! 
Now, beholding you, life has meaning, completeness, 

goodness ! 

Only at certain times may I see you. 
But the times between are filled with your image; 
And were I never to see you again 
There could be no death for me. 

For death is only to have missed the secret, the essence, 
of Hfe. 

Whenever, now, my eyelids close upon this earth where 

beauty walks, 
I shall fall asleep knowing the eternal truth of beauty; 
Knowing that when I wake again, and again, a million 

times again, 
I shall see beauty, the one imperishable thing! 

28 



A LOVER'S TRILOGY 

To die an eternal gainer, satisfied, 

Possessor of the fact that there is one most beautiful, 

Is not to die at all. 

It is only to have, for a little while, surcease of beauty; 

To rest, in smiling, dream-hung night. 

Before our eyes meet the next time, and the next! 

I am not grateful for anything but beauty. 

I shall never sing again of anything but beauty. 

My world — God's world — shall contain nothing but 

beauty. 
•Pain, harshness, cruelty, glory, adventure, energy — 
They are but scribbHngs on the slate. 
Rub them all out! 

And in their place write in letters of fire: 
" I have found beauty ! 
I am on my knees before beauty! 
I am grateful, with unending gratitude, to my God of 
beauty!" 

The kingdom of heaven is the kingdom of absolute 

beauty. 
In mortals, the measure of love is but that strong 

capacity 
To comprehend what is beautiful. 
Now, because you are all that beauty can be, 
Do I know myself a little child. 
With nothing of worth or purpose 
Save that I love you. 

29 



A LOVER'S TRILOGY 

Because I know this, at last, 

Is to have entered — a Httle child — into the kingdom 

of heaven. 
God be thanked, I have beheld you in the flesh! 
God be thanked, God be thanked! 

Beholding you, is heaven thrown wide ! 

Beholding you, my eyes drink from the spring of 
eternity ! 

Beholding you, life has meaning, completeness, good- 
ness ! 

II 

The Beloved 

Out of many lonely hours, my beloved. 
Out of the weaving and the unwinding. 
The flowering and the fading of many hours, 
You have come to me. 

Through all those lonely hours 
The gods were making you, my beloved; 
And all the while 

That they were plotting the beauty of you. 
The curve of your brow. 
The grace of you. 
The blue fire of your eye. 
The pout of your Hp, 
The excellence of your small strong hand, 

30 



A LOVER'S TRILOGY 

The hidden wonder of your laugh, 
I too lay plotting. 

Above all, I longed for you. 

You became my vigil and my adventure, 

My cue and my apology, 

My trust and my torment; 

For you were. 

Through the unending hours. 

The yet-unrecognized, 

The vision unfulfilled; ■ 

And that there really was sl you, 

I had come utterly to disbelieve. 

Then suddenly, 

When every door had closed. 

When every dream had dwindled. 

When every plot had failed, 

You appeared. 

You were therey 

At the very end of the journey. 

Before me; 

And my soul sprang into my eyes 

To salute you! 

Wherever you are 

There is music, with its echoes of romance, 

Like the widening ripples of a moonlit wake at sea. 

31 



A LOVER'S TRILOGY 

Wherever you are 

The current of the heart 

GUdes in a gentle enchanting rhythm; 

Yet with your coming 

Is the joy of impetuosity, 

And with your departure 

Is the sweetness of deliberation. 

I hold you to my breast, and thank God for you. 

Ill 

Absence 

You have hidden yourself away, 

Among your woods and your fields. 

The beautiful wild places your soul loves. 

You have taken the sunshine with you. 
You have left me the dark, and stillness. 
But the dark is odorous with sweet memory, 
And I can plunge my thought into it 
As I would bury my face in a great cool cluster 
Of velvety dew-gemmed black pansies. 

And the stillness ! It is like a goblet 
Slowly filling again during your absence, 
Every moment a colorless drop 
Brimming it with longing for your return. 

32 



A LOVER'S TRILOGY 

The darkness and the stilhiess, they are good. 
The dew of the pansies against my cheek 
Shall be my only tears. The passing moments, 
Pouring their songless stream into the beaker of silence. 
Shall be my only heart-throbs. 

I shall fling a fillet of dark flowers 

About your shoulders, oh my darling, 

When you come back to me. 

And I shall hold my brimming chalice out to you to 

quaff 
When you return, my longed-for darling. 

But at the thought of your eyes — 

Their startling light, their glory — 

I feel the unworthiness of my dusky blossoms. 

My fingers, that have woven them. 

Shall let slip the trembling coronal 

And shall clasp your neck untrammeled, unrestrained. 

And the clear cup of long waiting, of patient filling. 

When my lips have found yours. 

Shall tumble unheeded to the ground. 



THE LIFE BETWEEN 

Think thou of this, dear heart, when I shall be 
Not with thee as today, my hand in thine — 
That, wheresoever I am, and thou still here. 
That, whatsoe'er I do, and thou not near, 
I shall not count it heaven until thy kiss 
Shall end my waiting. Love, remember this. 

Think thou of this, my blessed, when God's will 
Divides us. I shall have but gone before 
That His hand may from this poor clay you see 
Mould me to something worthier of thee; 
And I shall welcome fire and count it bliss 
To purge my soul for thee ! Remember this. 

Think thou of this, sweetheart, when on thy soul 

At last shall fall the shadow of thine end; 

That, from the nearest borderland beyond. 

Mine arms, outstretched, shall clasp thee, and the bond 

Of lips and eyes shall live again nor miss 

Its olden sweetness. Yea, God grants love this. 



34 



PAN IN HIDING 

* 

Let me have music unpremeditate, 

Not played with obvious art, too close at hand. 

Let me hear lilting strains borne from afar, 

As in a dream of some forgotten land; 

Melodies made mysteriously sweet 

Through softly buffeting boughs — as when you near 

In greening forest-aisles a singing stream 

Whose chant comes fitfully upon the air 

At whimsy of stray winds that rise and sink 

In playful vagrancy along its brink. 

How all the pent and city-stagnant thoughts 
Fall captive to such lulling witchery, 
Leaving the mind unshackled and the heart 
Expectant, as if some familiar voice, 
Faintly hallooing out of springtimes lost, 
Had sought a wordless summons to impart. 

Instead of in a huge and garish hall 

Where, underneath a blaze of spurious light. 

Great throngs sit through a program patiently, 

I find my spirit soars to star-tracked height — 

Holding the meanest room romantical 

With rare enchantment — when, by merest chance 

35 



PAN IN HIDING 

Of window open on the dark, in drifts 
Harmony that does hush all utterance, 
Freed from a cello by quick hands that ply 
In some unknown high chamber neath the sky. 

How all the pent and city-stagnant thoughts 

Are touched to rainbow by the ensorcelling sounds, 

And how the thirster, when such rain sifts down, 

Is conscious of a freshening in his brain, 

As if an orchard breeze had found its way 

Into the long gray canyons of the town. 

To him who once — afield — has heard sweet stops 

Of rustic piping played in vales aloof. 

Or passage cry of birds, or grazing bell. 

No orchestra beneath theatric roof. 

No virtuoso facing footlight glare 

Can so illume the altars of his thought 

As when, unprompted, from some night-bird's breast 

A burst of passion, uncontrolled, untaught. 

Kindles the drowsy pulses of the night 

Like a nomadic meteor's argent flight! 

How all the pent and city-stagnant thoughts 
Sink soundless like the heavy lees of wine. 
Leaving a pure ambrosia in the cup — 
The spirit's chalice; which, when it o'erbrims. 
Pours its largesse of joy, new chinkling coins, 
Into the heart, and fills its alms-bowl up! 

36 



PERVERSITY 

I know a happiness that some call strange, 
The happiness of being in the dark — 
Alone in the rich, breathing, peopled dark. 

I know a grief that some have called profane. 
The grief of being in the searing sun, 
Surrounded by the unseeing, sunstruck crowd. 



37 



CAPRI 

Enchanting, and thyself enchanted still 

Since first upon thy shore the sirens* song 

Broke magically and was borne along 

Upon a thousand inlet waves to thrill 

The grotto's heart — so shalt thou be 

Until the end of time. Thou art the home 

Of vanished majesty, a golden tome 

Whose pages breathe a proud antiquity. 

Once thou didst glance and gleam with Roman towers, 

Once knew the Saracen heel, once felt the rod 

Of tawny Barbarossa. Tranquil now 

Thou liest dreaming through the peaceful hours 

The while thy peasants toil where Caesar trod 

And tend with songs the vine upon thy brow. 



38 



ANACAPRI 

The white narcissus, swaying on the breeze, 
Bends from its niche unreachable and wafts 
The scent of time-old sweetness that he quaffs 

Who sips today beneath the olive trees. 

Some loitering goddess at the close of day, 
To ease her of the circling gems she wore, 
Has laid her crown upon yon distant shore. 

See how it jewels all the darkening bay ! 

From hidden gardens on this isle of dream 
An echo of a song comes sweet and slow. 
The sea from amber melts to dappled fawn. 

From fawn to scattered primrose — gleam on gleam. 
A plash of oars comes up from far below, 

Stirs the soft air a moment, and is gone. 



39 



"ASK OF ME NOT MY STRENGTH" 

Ask of me not my strength to match with thine — 
The strength that Hes in cunning nimble thought, 
For what was worthiest in me, though wrought 

In darkness, gave I thee with the first sign 

Of love between us, and the gift was mine 

Of heart and soul in one great rapture caught, 
Of tears and smiles into strange union brought. 

O Love, a poor return for the divine 

Sweet touch thy claiming hand made known to me ! 
Yet now that I have learned all that thou art 

Shall I not praise my inefficiency, 

My poverty of light, my weaker part, 

Since in exchange for these thou couldst to me 
Entrust thy great, thy glorious childlike heart. 



40 



TRAVAIL 

Which one of us, I wonder, could we lift 
The burden of nights vigilant, the dread 

Of unhealed disappointments, unsoothed frights, 
Of patience worn to naked, nerveless thread — 

Which one of us, I wonder, running free. 

Loosed of our cares, would not a-sudden stop 

And falter at the gates of liberty. 

Lacking the well-known weight we learned to bear 
Hearing the call of one we loved the best, 

Missing the clasp of hands dependent still. 

Fearing, for need of us, they might not rest — 

Would we not, yearning, catch the burden up 
And clasp it on again with tender cries. 

Thankful 'twere given us to drain the cup? 



41 



NIGHT AND THE READER 

Painting the sombre shadows where they fall, 
Until the room is tapestried and warm 
And quaintly peopled as with many a form 

Passing in dim procession on the wall, 

A russet-pet aled lamp glows autumn-ripe. 
The hour is rich with silence, save the soft 

Recurrent bubble of a meerschaum pipe 
That sends thin, amethystine webs aloft 

To drift in pungent dust upon the dark. 
A curtain by the open window sways 

And flutters outward toward the empty park 
That sleeps moon-gilded in the autumn haze. 

Tolls midnight. With a half -reluct ant sigh 
A page is gently turned, the book put by. 



42 



TWO MASTERS 

Great Love, I sought to follow thee, to shun 
Only such creatures as — unlike to thee — 
Had lifted up their souls to vanity 
Or sworn deceitfully. And yet I won 
For this no smile from thee' as recompense 

But rather each new day marked more and more 
Estrangement from thee. I heard door on door 
Close ponderously between us, 'til the sense 
Of loneliness and failure was complete. 

Then probed I my soul's shrine for cause of it 
And found two altars where but one should be. 
Alas! Thine, Love, which should have been 
decked sweet. 
Stood bare and flameless, while the other, lit 
To hatred of thy foes, burned merrily ! 



43 



AFTER THE AUCTION 

Under the spell of things you used to love, 

I could not feel that it was well with you 
When death gave scattering hand to all you owned 

And to a vulturous world your treasures threw. 
Would it not pain you that some well-loved book 

Had fall'n to coarse, uncomprehending hands? 
Was it not sacrilege that arms less fair 

Should feel the clinging of these jewelled bands? 
Then to me, sorrowing, came answer clear, 
Healing the havoc of hurt memories: 

"You who delighted in my treasures small 
Think of me joying without bond or care. 
Know that no part of me remains in these. 

Speak of me greatly, as possessing all!" 



44 



CEDARS AT MONTEREY 

When windows give upon a lawn — as these — 
Stupendous with majestic, shadowy trees, 

I cannot help but feel that — gazing out 

Upon such splendor tapestried about — 
Even the paltriest mind, housed briefly here, 
Must find all worldly longings disappear 

And yield itself, abased, at beauty's shrine; 

Some hidden fount of strange, exotic wine 
Must flood its long-dried channels of delight 
And probe a nameless rapture at the sight 

Of mighty cedars, dreaming in the wind. 

What songs awake, what legends prick the mind, 
Of Puck and Pan and dryad-haunted trees. 
When windows give upon a lawn, as these ! 



45 



DEIRDRE 

She is a creature of a fair 

Unclouded sky, a vessel rare 

Wherein the elemental fire and snow 

By cunning alchemy are blent. This one 

Is Deirdre — all a woman, all a child, 

All to be loved. Yet she is wild 

As wood nymphs are, shy without fear. 

With eyes of wonder, and elusive foot, 

A lip where laughter nestles, and a breast 

Heaving to faintest music. She is blest 

Beyond her kind, for in her slender hands 

She bears the gift of sweet encouragement 

And they who once the wearier way have trod 

Find in her their desire, the smile of God. 



46 



LOVE ME WITH ALL THY TEARS 

Love me with all thy tears. To those who know 
No favor deeper than thy smile, to them 
Give what thou wilt of smiling words. I ask 
A dearer thing. It is that thou make mine 
Thy hours of pain. Do thou to me unmask 
The agonies that love accounts divine. 

Love me with all thy tears. There can no joy 
In this strange world make up one-half the sum 
That sorrow doth towards rare companionship. 
The grief -choked vows, unuttered, nearest lie 
To love's own shrine, — nor holds the lip 
In song one-half it breathes into a sigh. 

Love me with all thy tears. Then shall my soul 
Reach out to thee and know thee from the rest. 
Let me but find thee through my blinding tears, 
When thy soul too some white-faced misery sees; 
Let me but share thy broken hopes, thy fears; 
My heart — it shall be satisfied with these. 



47 



SEDITION 

There is one who moves with deadly, fawning foot. 
All day, all night, she pickets crowded paths 
And whiningly proclaims her bandaged eyes, 
The box for offerings strung around her neck. 
She taps along the curb with groping stick, 
Chicanery's signal to commiserate, 
The drumbeat of the knave and criminal. 

Or, in a sleeker guise, with mien sedate, 

Ingratiating, owlishly informed, 

Over the teacups and in huge bazaars 

She spreads her smoke barrage of noxious fears. 

Equivocation and a hint of tears 

Mask her grim message, yet diffuse its taint. 

Monotonously one taut string she plucks — 

Reluctance that we lose our manhood's flower — 

Poltroonery's thesis ever since the palm 

Of Midas bore, within its cozening touch, 

The sleeping-sickness of the over-fed. 

The smug security of padded lives. 

Professing pity for his ignorance. 
Wonder and pain at his credulity, 

48 



SEDITION 

She strokes the long ears of her ravished dupe; 
Urges good Bottom that he close his eyes 
To cloaked incendiary, stabbing danger home, 
And wink with her at crawling menaces 
Rising with sea-bed slime upon their snouts. 

She haunts and hungrily observes the men 

And women who are disappointment's prey, 

Sterile, like shell-holes. 

Like moon-craters, quenched. 

With souls that sleep the Awful, menacing sleep 

Of things inflammable and tindery. 

Therein she pours her swift libation — hate. 

And when their wicks are saturate and swoU'n, 

Her arm darts forward with its licking torch. 

**Now dance for me, you pretty flames! Now leap, 

You riotous, unruly fires! Behold 

The priestess of your saturnalia! Now 

To your merry music and your yellow sparks. 

Leaping aloft to sear the seraph-eyed, 

I whirl me to your bellowing bacchanale! 

I dance! I dance! I dance!" 

The altar seethes. 
Malevolence, with savage shout, receives 
The homage of his devotees, until 
In the forlornest vale of hell there rings 
The echo of their spent insanity. 



49 



FROM ONE APART 

The skies shall smile to greet thy gaze. 

But I must stand apart; 
Yet I shall feel thy presence, too, 

And all thou art. 

And all thou art! 

The rain shall fall upon thy cheek. 
The snows upon thy heart, 

Yet I shall love thee to the end 
For what thou art. 
For what thou art ! 



50 



AT THE CROSSROADS 

I that am Sorrow called, bid thee farewell — 
Yet, as I go, I would that thou shouldst see 

Why I have journeyed at thy side so long, 
Why, undesired, unhid, I clung to thee. 

If I have proved a comrade silent, dire, 

Let me now speak who erst was granite-lipped; 

If I have leaned too gallingly my weight, 
Let me restore to thee thy wings, joy-tipped! 

If I have forced from thee some hard-wrung tears, 
They, through a cunning alchemy I wield. 

Served but the chemist's purpose, to transmute 
To flashing steel thy dull and leaden shield. 

Whilst we have climbed together, steep on steep, 
(This was the charge laid on me from above) 

All of thy future neath my cloak I bore; 
Take from me now this earnest of my love. 

For an old weakness that beset thee once 
I give thee strength to bear a greater ill, 

51 



AT THE CROSSROADS 

For an old terror that benumbed thy heart 
I give thee courage and a newborn will. 

For every tear shed selfishly I give 

Forgetfulness of self, for every loss 
A mind more calm, an eye to recognize 

The artlessness of good, the masks of dross. 

With these, here's understanding, so that thou 
Mayst know and love thy brother passing well; 

Comforting him, thou shalt remember me. 
I, that am Sorrow called, bid thee farewell. 



52 



IMPORTUNATE 

I am eager for winter to come 
And fold its white arms 'round this home, 
This tangled and flower-spent lawn. 
I am eager for winter to come. 

I am longing for winter to sing 
In the thin-pencilled treetops, and bring 
Sudden gusts down the chimney's wide throat. 
I am longing for winter to sing. 

I am homesick for lamplight and dreams, 
For the firelog that flickers and gleams — 
Pranking shadows that play on the wall. 
I am homesick for lamphght and dreams. 



53 



LIFE 

Art at a distance stands to gaze; 
Bent History writes at her feet; 
Music close nestles to her heart, 
Poesy — cheek to cheek. 



54 



TOLL-GATE 

Beauty is yours, 
(Witness these unsleeping eyes of mine!) 
Unmatched the timbre of your voice, 

Patrician-fine. 

I look, I listen, 

Meanly then take toll. 
"Pass on! Yet stay — I'd know, sir. 
Have you declared a soul? " 

A will imperious, 
(Witness these my chains!) 
Hands where passion sleeps 

And power reigns. 

I bend, I whisper 

With ill-feigned control, 
"Magnificent! And lacking only 
One small thing, a living soul!" 



55 



TO A VIS-A-VIS 

Now I never have spoken to you 
And you never have spoken to me, 

For the gods that dispose of these things 
Have decreed that that never shall be. 

But we've come a long way just the same 

On the road only lovers can see, 
Though I never have spoken to you 

And you never have spoken to me. 

There's a strange little room in my heart 
With a door that leads only to you; 

It's a magical door, and it melts quite away 
When our eyes meet and signal what's true. 

Then out on the road of the heart 
We may fare for that flash of an eye. 

And the world is forgotten in wondrous content 
And whole centuries seem to slip by. 

But why ever we have to come back 

Through that doorway that keeps us apart, 

56 



TO A VIS-A-VIS 

Is the thing that bewilders us both 
And the thing that is breaking my heart. 

For I never have spoken to you. 
And you never have spoken to me, 

Since the gods that dispose of these things 
Have decreed that that never shall be. 

Yet weVe come a long way just the same 
On the road only lovers can see — 

Though I never have spoken to you, 
And you never have spoken to me! 



57 



TO A VERY LITTLE BOY 

My feet go forward every day — 
The same old way, the same old way, 

But all the while, aye every mile. 

Aye all the weary, weary while. 
My mind spins bridges back to where I lost the way 
that led to you! 

My eyes behold me every day — 
A little thinner, sadder, gray ! 

But memory's eyes — they do not change. 

You do not come to disarrange 
The you my memory looks upon — the distant, sweet, 
unchanging you ! 



58 



PETITION 

All that Love is no mortal heart can know. 
And even knowing little, doubts it true. 

One gift I ask of Love, 
And that gift, you! 

Love must be kinder than the dreams of men, 
Yet dreams may yield the waiting heart its clue. 

One gift I ask of Love, 
And that gift, you! 

Love must be generous if it be Love, 

No boon refuse for which I sue. 
One other gift I ask. 

Let me belong to you ! 



59 



AFTER READING WALT WHITMAN 

Spirit within, reveal me to myself! 

As truth around me is, so must it be 

Within me. Spare no swift-rent veil, for I 

Would know that truth which frees, and lets me claim 

My fellows as the man Walt Whitman did, 

Who drew them to his breast, then held them off 

With hands that clung and blest; who called their grace, 

Their glory and their foulness his, and knew 

With Christ that love outweighs the heaviest sin. 

How strong is borne your message to my soul. 
That as I am, so a//, in some degree; 
That spirits toil in turmoil and unrest, 
Seeking to fit together broken hopes 
And memories of beautiful ideals. 

Source of All, uplift us to your heart! 
Touch these our lips from murmuring to song. 
Teach our slow tongues to rapture and exult, 
Our stubborn wills to know your deep repose. 

1 see all lives as bubbles, lucent spheres 
Pressing and striving upwards, what a throng! 

60 



AFTER READING WALT WHITMAN 

They touch but momently the slightest part 
Of their encircling mutual compassings. 
They contact only to withdraw again 
And separately pursue their given course. 

How fearsomely we guard the perfect globe 
We think contains our individual self ! 
And that explored, how ceaseless is the urge 
To give the borrowed vessel back again 
And let the fluid soul it held leap forth 
Free to rejoin its natural element. 

Each day this orb of self, revolving, wounds 
And tortures me within its opaque shell. 
I faint within my confines, and I beat 
My hampered wings against captivity. 

I know the prison is a brittle thing. 
I know that I shall rend it. All the forms 
That echo senseless laws, rebuffing love, 
Shall cease for me. I shall emerge and know 
My brother, and this darkling loneliness 
Will be a dream forever passed away. 



61 



THE CUP OF HEMLOCK 

The tragic day was not when you were cruel, 

For in your bitterness I found a hint 

At least of mounting flame. Nor was the day 

A tragic one when finally you fell 

Upon my breast, with eyes abashed, tear-blind. 

The tragic day was when I saw not one 

Of these high raptures — love, nor love's disdain. 

But lolling in their place that deadly thing 

With dull, blown eyeUds — pale satiety. 

The tragic day when you were simply — kind. 



62 



TO EROS — A PROTEST 

Little god! Little god! Will you never be appeased? 
Look you, tlie youths of all the world have brought 
In your high honor offerings untold. 
Why must you frown impatiently on these 
And bid us fire the pulses of the old! 

Little god! Little god! Will you never have done? 

Look you, no living heart has e'er escaped 

The tithe exacted, though reluctant torn. 

Yet on these things you gaze indifferently. 

"Make mine," you say, "the hearts of the unborn!" 



63 



POTENTIALITIES 

Thoughts for my poems are Hke hidden nests; 
A leaf turned back, a twig snap't, there they he! 
That they are secret is the joy that rests 
And comforts me: that I may keep them hidden, 
Knowing I may return when woods be still, 
And coax the nestlings into life at will. 

That they are mine to warm, and urge, and train 
To spread their wings and utter notes of joy, 
Mine to behold as bit by bit they gain 
A plumage worthy of their empery, 
This single rapture to my life belongs — 
An endless brooding o'er my fledgeling songs. 



64 



HOURS OF NEW SUMMER 

Clover tops are nodding beneath an opal noon. 
A lark has darted upward, I'll be hearing from him soon. 
In my heart a throbbing; in my head a soncy tune. 

June — June ! 

Glinty moths are fluttering beneath a pollened moon. 
Sleepless waves are pulsing to the rim of the lagoon. 
In my heart a throbbing, in my head a soncy tune. 

June — June ! 



65 



PASTORALE 

' (Sonata I) 

I heard Scarlatti played upstairs 
And, dreaming here alone, 

The dusk of this high-ceiled room 
With golden rain was strown. 

The wall before me melted soft 

Into a branched glade. 
I heard the stamp of dancing faun 

The while a shepherd played. 



66 



CLIFF'S EDGE 

Here is the bowl of sunset; 

Turn you west and see 
Clouds like slender fantailed gold-fish 

Swimming in an amber sea! 

Here is the bowl of sunset; 

Turn you east and see 
Clouds like bears on a drifting ice-floe 

Pearl and lapis lazuli ! 



67 



JULY GREEN 

Green on green ! The short grass at my feet. 

The clipped yew-hedge, the path of mortised stones, 
Like bits of gray-green cloisonne deep sunk 

In malachite. Beyond, the bronze-green tones 
Of meadows burnished bright with clover heads; 

Gold-green of willow sharp against a pine. 
Silken blue-green of lengthening grain, and last 

The far-off framing green of forest line. 



68 



NIPPON FISHERMAN'S SONG 

In a garden of Yoshida an old wistaria grows, 
It winds along the red-arclied bridge where Shira River 
flows. 

Ai, aiy Jcorede sunda! 

I would that I were there — 
In old Yoshida's garden where that purple flower blows. 

In a garden of Yoshida an old wistaria clings 
And twines aroimd a bamboo gate where sweet Wakana 
sings. 
Ai, ai, Tcorede sundal 
Now laggard oars, leap on ! 
Wakana's caught and spun my thought to strange 
enchanted things. 

In silver-roofed Yoshida an old wistaria dreams 
Of lovers young, and voices filtered faint through white 
starbeams. 
Ai, ai, korede sunda! 
Swift Shira, bear me on — 
Wakana's voice is calling, where that old wistaria 
dreams. 

69 



THE SHOP OF GOD 

What did you pay, I wonder, as I sit 
And think of the astounding bill we ran. 
Somehow the thought strikes in most poignantly 
That you were always reckoning the price. 
Counting the cost and ever watching for 
The hidden tag eventually to fall 
From out the yards of shimmering cloth-of-gold 
We measured off between us at God's shop. 
How prodigal we were with loveliness, 
Laughing and tugging at the endless bolt. 
Each pulling opposite ways until our arms 
Ached with the wealth of beauty that they held, 
Letting the fringes trail and gather mud 
As off we bore the plunder of those hours. 

Perhaps the heart pays on the installment plan. 
Cash down? Oh never! Rather drop by drop. 
And keeps the wound well opened till 'tis purged. 
And so, good trafficker in this great-mart. 
Beware of what you buy, and when your eyes 
Cling tempted to some fabric passing fair. 
Pull over them that thinking-cap of yours — 
Oh pull it well adown, and suffer not 

70 



THE SHOP OF GOD 

The artful merchant to enhst your purse 
Deeper than what will give one day of joy. 

One day of joy! If you have had but one 
To hoard unto your bosom all your life. 
Then you are rich beyond the miser's dream. 
Seek not to purchase what may fill your barns; 
Press not with gold the skiKul artisans 
To build you housing for your fuller years; 
All will collapse in dust about your ears 
Except that one unpurchasable thing, 
That day you travelled hand in hand with joy! 



71 



EX-IMPASSIONATA 

I would have no more loving, oh my love! 

Give me disdain, great purging flames of it 
To lift me fair from this engulfing pit 

And leave my spirit where cool dawns are lit. 

I would have no more loving, oh my love ! 

Give me neglect, great waves of cruelty 
To wash me up from this enfolding sea 

And leave me beached upon tranquillity. 



72 



SUCH STUFF AS DREAMS ARE MADE ON 

I know a wandering voice that swells and sinks 
Upon the rise and falling of the wind, 
Singing its message out of timeless space: 

"Love is remembering," and again it cries 
"Remembering is love — is all of love." 

I know a wandering voice that swells and sinks 
Upon the rise and falling of the wind, 
Singing its message out of timeless space: 

"Death is forgetting," and again it cries, 
"Forgetting — that is all there is of death." 



73 



EDEN PRAIRIE 

Little road to Eden Prairie 

Shall I follow you again. 
Where you wind through plumey tamarack 

And dip to sedgy glen? 

Shall I see your dust-brown ribbon 
Hem the summer-mantled hills 

With their lakelets sewn like sequins 
And their silver-threaded rills? 

Shall I hear the great wind singing 
Where the prairie bares its breast 

To the kisses of Hyperion 
As he rides into the west? 

Shall the smoke-wreaths of the twilight 
Weave their spell? Shall my heart bound 

To the drumbeats of the little folk 
That guard the reed-grown pond? 

I shall weary for your wildness, 
I shall weary, wondering when, 

Little road to Eden Prairie, 
I shall follow you again ! 

74 



TO AN OLD BOKHARA 

Dim ancient fabric spread upon my floor, 
How in the moonrise like a floating rose 
You lie impooled in silver ! And how veiled, 
As with the powdery blue that dusts a plum. 
Your sleeping colors melt in soft repose! 

I lean you o'er, as o'er a dappled bed 

Of motley-pebbled brook whose mosaic tints 

Gleam through the amber of autumnal stream. 

I trace the faded pattern of your veins, 

And dream of orient nights you left long since. 

You felt perchance the marble of some mosque, 
The print of holy feet. Or in the mart 
At Shirabad, you flashed upon a youth 
Who paid your price ungrudgingly, to spread 
Your hues before the mistress of his heart. 

Through some pale dawn of eastern bridal night 

A lover to his lotus-lidded fair 

Has sung, extolling her, and bidding you 

Make for her feet a tiny garden plot 

Of rosy petals, woven with matchless care. 

75 



TO AN OLD BOKHARA 

Now in the moonlight on my polished floor 
You speak to me of Oxus' golden spell, 
River whose bosom may have borne a barge 
That wore you, lustrous, on her curtained deck, 
Your fringes trailing in the rippled swell. 

Out of the old mysterious East you bring 
Visions of Panja vale and Khanabad, 
Plane-trees and pomegranates quivering in the air, 
Girdling the water-towers of Kala Khum, 
Mortar and stone in budding hawthorne clad. 

Into the West your voiceless message comes, 
A scroll of beauty from an ancient land 
Where swift dark fingers conjure at a loom; 
I close my eyes upon you — and the night 
Echoes with weavers' songs of Samarkand! 



76 



EVENFALL 

Now to its arms the twilight spirit draws 

The sunbeams that have danced here all day through. 
Oh, take me in your arms a little while; 

My heart, that danced with yours, would slumber too ! 



77 



COGNIZANCE 

I know no headier wine for youth or age 

Than silence — when the cup is shared by two; 

No bullets surer of their mark than eyes 
That, meeting, interchange the one word "You!" 



78 



MATER DOLOROSA 

Of what avail the word when born too late. 
When time to speak is past, forever fled ! 

I am the mother of a stillborn host 
Of laggard, wingless thoughts, of crippled hopes, 
Of longings held in leash mitil they've lost 
Their birthright of desire, their christening fire. 
I am the mother that must ceaseless mourn 
Her broken darlings, her belated dears. 

How beautiful my children are in death! 
My nurslings, all too tardily embarked. 
And one by one expiring in my arms ! 

They come to me on drowning floods of spring. 
On searing breath from sandy, desolate wastes; 
They come to me on moon rays from a world 
Exhausted, pallid, dead beyond all dreams ! 

Most strange and proud and wistful are they ever. 
And with such bitter beauty in their eyes. 



79 



MATER DOLOROSA 

For none of them but wear the shadowy wreath 
Death placed upon their brows ere they were mine; 
And none there are whose Hps, alas, my kiss 
Can redden into song or coax to mirth! 

Of what avail the word when born too late ! 
Of what avail these tears, 
Of what avail ! 



80 



TO CESIRA, DANCING 

Thy motion doth bewitch the gazer's thought 
When hghtly to and fro thy footsteps pass, 

Ev'n as a flower, that, swaying in the wind, 
Weaveth its shadow's charm upon the grass. 



81 



INDIAN SUMMER 

Strange I should seek again the woodland thicket 
Where by your side so oft of old I'd fling me; 

For, on the breeze that once, rose-heavy, fanned us. 
Only a wing-tired bee droops by — to sting me ! 



82 



vox HUMANA 

{With an orchestra at the Orangerie.) 

There is something astir in this room. 
Something awake and on wing, 
Soaring above this great crowd, 
Pulsing and throbbing beneath 
This smoke-hidden roof with its lamps 
Heavy-shaded and pendulous, twined 
With a thick imitation of leaves. 

The heartbroken hear it, the tired 
And noise-sickened, weary of blare. 
The soul of the satiate stirs. 
It pierces and stabs where he dreams 
Befuddled and futile and dull. 
The lovers — they hear it! I see 
Here an eye Ughting strangely, a brow 
Clearing suddenly, freed from its pain. 
And there! What a wonderful look! 
What a startled, uplifted young face. 
Or old one, grown young for a breath 
As if, on its rapturous flight, 
A wing from high heaven had stooped 
And brushed all the furrows away 
Leaving the crimson of youth. 
The high-mantling beauty of youth! 

83 



UNCOMFORTED 

If, in the hours when I am most beset. 
My hand could touch yours for the briefest space. 
If I could brush aside the rising tears 
Just long enough to see your gentle face. 
What clearing of my sky, and what a crown 
Of laughter undismayed, what victory 
Were mine to know, if, in those hours beset, 
My fears could meet with your philosophy. 



84 



A PRAYER 

Angel of strength, 

I need thee sore. 
Come from thy fastness, 

Wrap me o'er. 
Let thy brave calm, 

Like mantle wide. 
Fall on my heart 

And there abide. 
Teach me the sweet 

Control you use. 
That I may not 

Good patience lose. 
My need is not 

For power to do; 
For quiet strength, 

Angel, I sue. 
Grant then thy peace — 

That succor sure; 
Strength to be weak, 

Strength to endure. 
Then, I beUeve, 

Will my blind eyes 

85 



A PRAYER 

See the great secret 

In the skies; 
That all is well 

And good, not drear; 
That paths were thorny 

But through fear; 
That tasks are glorious 

And not tasks 
That God grants all 
To him that asks. 



86 



SONG 

The hour is late and we have drifted far — 
Far into the enchantment of the night; 
The starHt maze of bloom upon the shore 
Melts into one white line, and soon the wave 
That bears us on shall hide that too from sight. 

The hour is late, and see, a flock of dreams 
Follow, all drowsy-winged, the wave where dips 
Our shallop's prow. Ah, Sweet, sing on, for then 
The bandit dreams will flee the beckoning dawn, 
Nor hush my joy, the song upon thy lips. 



87 



FULFILLMENT 

The deepening sky, and then, a single star; 

A wilderness of promise, then a flower; 
World's silence everywhere, and then, thy voice; 

In each, Eternity, and this one hour. 



88 



BLOOD OF YOUTH 

Think not to find the hiding place of winds 
That toss thy tiny kite askew, nor ride 

A-hunting for some breeze that blows aright 
To fill the drooping pennons of thy pride. 

Let life in thee be as a bell suspent, 
That swings to every pulsing of the air, 

Nor cavil if thy clapper's voice be harsh 

Whilst others vibrate with a sound more rare. 



89 



LIFE SITS A-WAITING 

There is an appointed place for thee, my striving soul. 
When thou hast ceased to struggle on wings of thine 
own making; 
When thou hast laid aside the impatient chisel of thy 
will, 
Thy half-hewn deities for One forsaking. 

With fretful foolishness and foreboding hast thou built 
A mighty dike against the onrushing years; 

With laughter and with love must thou dissolve it 
If thou wouldst taste of salt not born of tears. 



90 



IMPROMPTUS 

Great raptures spring unheralded. Great boons 
Come stealthily upon us, unforeseen. 

Who shall presage the maple's first red leaf, 
Or the first robin, ere the maple's green? 



91 



I WOULD NOT BARTER RUE FOR ROSE 

I would not barter rue for rose 

If, in the culling of it, 
The rue had brought our hearts more close 

And so we'd learned to love it. 

I would not change the days we've spent 

In fair or cloudy weather. 
Had all those days, the gay and sad. 

Been spent, dear boy, together. 

But oh, to live again the days 

When we apart were faring ! 
I would those days had never been 

That missed the joy of sharing. 



92 



